Autor Cointelegraph By Luke Huigsloot

FTX names Kroll as claims agent, to update users on bankruptcy developments

Bankrupt crypto exchange FTX has appointed restructuring administration firm Kroll as its agent to track all claims against FTX and ensure interested parties are notified of developments throughout its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case.Known as the “claims and noticing agent,” Kroll was appointed to the role on Nov. 12 with the news made public on Nov. 17, and aims to compile a database of all claims against FTX Trading and 101 affiliated companies.Press Release: FTX Group has established Kroll as its claims agent, and all official documents filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court can be found online at https://t.co/7Bsn9Ggckf. pic.twitter.com/OFuCmlJXgJ— FTX (@FTX_Official) November 17, 2022At the time of writing, this database lists only eight claims, including one from Singaporean-based blockchain development firm Ethereal Tech for $11.7 million, but will soon be fleshed out as more claims against the group are lodged.For example, one other case that Kroll has worked on, that of rental car company Hertz, has 62,061 claims against it from its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case.The eight claims currently included already amount to $40.9 million, though FTX Trading alone is understood to owe customers and investors as much as $8 billion.Within the filing, the firm has also compiled a list of interested parties it will keep updated on developments, which it acknowledges is incomplete and does not currently include customers.This list is currently composed of approximately 750 parties who have some kind of interest in the case, with some of the included groups consisting of debtors, banks, landlords, insurance providers, directors, landlords, and regulators.Some noteworthy names included in the list are National Australia Bank (NAB), Apple, Facebook, JPMorgan, Chainalysis, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Circle, Stephen Curry, Reddit, and Yuga Labs. Meanwhile, the number of creditors involved with FTX is thought to be in excess of one million, and corporate securities lawyer Margaret Rosenfeld told Cointelegraph it will take years before any begin to receive any funds back, adding: “You can’t make creditor distributions until these claims are analyzed. It’s also way too early to speculate on what kind of distribution creditors will get back. Though in mega cases, such as this, full recovery would be unusual.”Kroll Restructuring Administration is an indirect subsidiary of Kroll LLC, which is one of the world’s largest corporate intelligence companies. Notably, the firm had been employed by Harvey Weinstein on multiple occasions, including when allegations of sexual harassment were brought against him in 2016. Related: SBF received $1B in personal loans from Alameda: FTX bankruptcy filingThe parent company offers a wide range of services in areas such as environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG), valuation, compliance, cyber risk, investigations, and corporate finance.On Nov. 15, regulators in the Bahamas argued that FTX’s new CEO lacks the authority to initiate Chapter 11 proceedings in the United States, with the provisional liquidator overseeing the bankruptcy proceedings of FTX Digital Markets in The Bahamas rejecting the “validity of any purported attempt to place FTX Affiliates in bankruptcy.”

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Tremors from FTX's collapse reverberate through the scientific community

The fall of crypto exchange FTX appears to have already begun to impact the hundreds of grant recipients across a variety of philanthropic organizations backed by the exchange. During the COVID-19 pandemic, FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried became known for backing a number of causes aimed at “humanity’s long-term prospects.”One of these was the FTX Foundation and its FTX Future Fund, which publicly launched on Feb. 28 and reported on Jun. 30 that it had made 262 grants and investments totaling $132 million in projects — many of these involved in pandemic preparedness, among other scientific pursuits. However, the leadership team of the Future Fund announced their resignation on Nov. 11 in a group post noting: “We are devastated to say that it looks likely that there are many committed grants that the Future Fund will be unable to honor.”According to a Nov. 14 report from Science.org, there have been a number of grant recipients now concerned about their future following the FTX collapse, with SecureBio’s co-founder Kevin Esvelt suggesting that the firm is seeking emergency backup funding, stating: “We don’t think it is right that anyone should lose their jobs over a financial calamity totally unrelated to the excellent work they are doing”Other recipients of the Future Fund’s money include Biotechnology firm Sherlock Biosciences which was awarded $2 million to study infectious diseases, biotechnology firm HelixNano which was awarded $10 million for vaccine research, SecureBio which was awarded $1.2 to develop better pandemic defenses, and Our World in Data which was awarded $7.5 million to track trends relevant to humanity’s long term prospects.Related: What can blockchain do for increasing human longevity?Another foundation funded by Bankman-Fried — Building a Stronger Future — has given the first tranche of a $5 million grant to the non-profit investigative reporting organization ProPublica, with more funds initially planned to be distributed in 2023 and 2024. According to an email shared with the business magazine Fortune, the remaining funds are on hold while Building a Stronger Future assesses its finances.Meanwhile, lawyer and member of the Effective Altruism group Molly Kovite has warned in a Nov. 14 post that organizations which received money from an FTX entity in the 90 days prior to the Chapter 11 filing on Nov. 11 may even be subject to a “clawback” and be required to pay all or some of the money back. Open Philanthropy, the philanthropic funder which Kovite represents, later shared in a Nov. 16 post that it was seeking applications from grantees affected by the collapse of the Future Fund, and will evaluate the applications and provide funding at their discretion.

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Sam Bankman-Fried says he regrets filing for bankruptcy: Report

The former CEO of FTX Sam Bankman-Fried has expressed deep regret over filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week, calling it his “biggest single fuckup.” In a wide-ranging interview with VOX which was published on Nov. 16, Bankman-Fried reportedly answered questions on a number of topics such as the Nov. 11 Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, his thoughts on regulators, ethics, how FTX and Alameda “gambled with customer money,” and the FTX hack. According to screenshots of the Twitter conversation between VOX reporter Kelsey Piper and Sam Bankman-Fried, the former FTX CEO said that although he has made multiple mistakes, the biggest one was listening to what people told him to do and filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.“I fucked up big multiple times,” Bankman-Fried wrote. “you know what was maybe my single biggest fuckup?” “The one thing *everyone* told me to do […] chapter 11.”Bankman-Fried said that if he hadn’t filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy, “everything would be ~70% fixed right now,” with “withdrawals would be opening up in a month with customers fully whole,” adding:“But instead I filed, and the people in charge of it are trying to burn it all to the ground out of shame”After admitting to a “liquidity crunch” on Nov. 8, Bankman-Fried had reportedly sought $8 billion from investors in emergency funding to cover a shortfall, even offering his personal wealth to “make customers and investors whole.”When asked what was next for him, Bankman-Fried suggested he still had two weeks to get the $8 billion, which is “basically all that matters for the rest of my life.”However, in a Nov. 16 statement, FTX CEO and chief restructuring officer John Ray has reminded the public that Bankman-Fried “has no ongoing role at [FTX], FTX US, or Alameda Research Ltd. and does not speak on their behalf.”Related: FTX’s new CEO John Ray coldly addresses SBF’s erratic tweetsTurning to other topics discussed during the interview, Bankman-Fried said that his push for regulations was “just PR,” before adding:“Fuck regulators, they make everything worse, they don’t protect customers at all”Hours later, Bankman-Fried appeared to have walked those sentiments back, noting in a Nov. 16 tweet that:”It’s really hard to be a regulator. They have an impossible job: to regulate entire industries that grow faster than their mandate allows them to.”27) A few thoughts:a) It’s *really* hard to be a regulator. They have an impossible job: to regulate entire industries that grow faster than their mandate allows them to.And so often they end up mostly unable to police as well as they ideally would.— SBF (@SBF_FTX) November 16, 2022Bankman-Fried also confirmed that the money being removed out of FTX was indeed a hack, suggesting it was either an “ex-employee, or malware on an ex-employee’s computer.”The former CEO has once again stood behind his claim in a deleted tweet that FTX has never invested clients assets, suggesting it “was factually accurate” as Alameda was the company which was investing the funds. Cointelegraph has reached out to Sam Bankman-Fried for additional commentary but has not received a response by the time of publication.

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FTX downfall was a turning point for citizen journalism: Coinbase CEO

Coinbase CEO and co-founder Brian Armstrong have applauded the work of citizen journalists and blockchain analysts surrounding the unfolding FTX crisis and its former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.In a Nov. 16 tweet that has been retweeted over 9,000 times at the time of writing, Armstrong suggested that it has been regular citizens, rather than traditional media that has uncovered many of the developments associated with the liquidity crunch and subsequent bankruptcy filing of FTX.Commenting on a recent New York Times “puff piece,” Armstrong said it: “Feels like a turning point for citizen journalism and loss of trust in MSM” — referring to mainstream media.Twitter has broken just about every piece of this FTX story using blockchain analytics, while NYT is writing puff pieces on a criminal.Feels like a turning point for citizen journalism and loss of trust in MSM.— Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) November 16, 2022Crypto Twitter has also been highly critical of the article, with Polygon Studios CEO Ryan Wyatt tweeting at the author of the article that Bankman-Fried had “committed significant crimes” and it was “a disservice to all of those impacted.”Elon Musk has tweeted about the rise of citizen journalism on Twitter multiple times since acquiring the social media network in October.Mainstream media will still thrive, but increased competition from citizens will cause them to be more accurate, as their oligopoly on information is disrupted— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 11, 2022

As an example of the rise of blockchain analysis and citizen journalism, on Nov. 5 blockchain tracker Whale Alert shared that just under 23 million FTX Token (FTT), representing approximately 17% of the circulating supply and valued at $584.8 million at the time, had been moved onto Binance.This event turned out to be one of the first signs of FTX’s liquidity crises, a story that was not picked up by the NYT until Nov. 8.Blockchain investigators were also the first to break the news of the FTX hack, with the movements of funds to different wallets being closely tracked by Twitter users who deduced it was a hack hours before FTX’s official announcement.Twitter Spaces has also become home to “The Roundtable Show,” a gathering of crypto community members hosted by Mario Nawfal which has been providing live updates and commentary on the FTX saga as it develops with figures such as Musk, BankToTheFuture CEO Simon Dixon, and internet entrepreneur Kim Dotcom who have joined with 891,499 people tuning in.Related: FTX hacker is now the 35th largest holder of ETHWhile Twitter has often been instrumental in breaking news and analysis on the FTX saga, it also has harbored its fair share of conspiracy theories and outright false information.Bankman-Fried’s recent cryptic Twitter thread caused wildfire rumors on the platform that he was using the newly posted tweets to delete older, possibly incriminating ones, a theory that was later debunked.Twitter users also pointed to Bankman-Fried’s private jet leaving The Bahamas for Argentina on Nov. 12 and speculated he was fleeing there, which he denied, and a source later told Cointelegraph that Bankman-Fried was under supervision by Bahamian authorities.

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Crypto stablecoin issuer Circle adds Apple Pay support

Circle, the issuer of the United States dollar-pegged stablecoin USD Coin (USDC), has added support for Apple Pay — with the intention of bringing the crypto and traditional payment systems closer together.Circle made the announcement in a Nov. 15 blog post suggesting it may boost sales for crypto-native businesses as they can facilitate traditional payments from non-crypto-using customers while enabling customers to “buy crypto with Apple Pay on their preferred exchange.”According to Circle, the addition of Apple Pay support will benefit traditional businesses by allowing them “to shift more retail payments to digital currency.”Apple Pay is available to “eligible businesses” and claims enabling it is “a simple process”, meanwhile customers who checkout with Apple Pay at participating firms will finalize the transaction, as usual, using Apple’s Face ID or Touch ID.Apple has over 1.8 billion active devices worldwide Apple’s CEO Tim Cook claimed in a Q1 2022 earnings call. Apple Pay is one of the most used digital wallets in the U.S. behind PayPal according to reports.Related: Apple job listings and patents hint at foray into ‘3D mixed-reality world’USDC has the second largest market cap within the stablecoin market, surpassed only by Tether (USDT), which in the wake of the FTX downfall stoked fear in investors after it depegged slightly from the USD. In an interview with Cointelegraph, Circle’s vice president of product Joao Reginatto mentioned that they envision the future will be a “multichain world” soon after Circle’s announcement on Sept. 28 that they would rollout its stablecoin across Polkadot (DOT), Optimism (OP), Near Protocol (NEAR), Arbitrum, and Cosmos (ATOM) blockchains.Both Tether and Circle have denied having any exposure to FTX and Alameda as contagion from the fallout of one of the former-largest crypto exchanges in the world spreads throughout the industry.

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